Laughing On The Inside.

That pretty much sums it up!

Grow up

Am I bored out of my mind or what?
It’s so strange when my usual chat buddies are not on-line. It leaves me with no one to chat with except ……….

Seems like our family just keeps growing and growing and growing…

Some family members only have time for an occasional visit.

Some family members have other obligations that prevent them for being here fulltime.

Some family members are only welcome for an occssional visit. (No, I’m not referring to you!)

And then sometimes we add a new family member who just sits around smiling. He may not say much, and he certainly doesn’t eat much, but he is always here when we need someone to listen to our funny stories, bad jokes, and ridiculous rants and raves.

Here is a picture of me (yes, a 49 year old man) with my newest cub…CJ.
He was born at the Buffalo Build-A-Bear workshop, but he now resides in Marcy NY.

Not quite as crazy as Animal House, but JP and I have the winter blahs… so how do you beat the winter blahs? ROAD TRIP!

We started out after work last night and I must admit I was cranky! I had a terrible stress head-ache and nothing JP did or said could make me feel better. I was just a crank… thank God he tolerates me!

This morning was a different story…
I woke up cheery and headache free in the Christiana, Delaware Days Inn and headed off for warmer weather….

We stopped near Rehobeth at 11:30 for breakfast…errr… lunch…..

and then at 2PM promptly we checked in to the spectacular Sheraton Hotel in Virginia Beach (Room 1111 if you are planning to stop by)

After changing into shorts (I’ll send you a picture later cub), we spent several hours strolling along the beach side boardwalk, people watching, and laughing like lovers… and now we are relaxing and blogging (duh).

Maybe we’ll have Dirty Dicks for supper. (It’s a restaurant folks, get your mind out of the gutter)

So today is March 5 and I’ve been home from Disney since Feb 20, so I’ll try to wrap it up with a couple quick shots from Animal Kingdom and Disney Studios.

If you read yesterday’s post, you already know that my computer issues have delayed my updates and therefore these posts don’t truly reflect my love and passion for all things Disney. I’m actually sad to say that this was not my BEST Disney experience because of some work issues that I was dealing with (imagine a 3 hour conference call while in the Animal Kingdom), but even a bad day at Disney is better than a normal day anywhere else.

I am still and always will be a friend of Walt and the gang… and Disney World will always be the happiest place on earth to me. We may have to make a second trip this year, just to remember the magic.

Who is that guy? Stay on the bus!

JP startling the natives

If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then….

Out of the jungle and on to the Streets of San Francisco

and one last shot….

And just a reminder…. it’s a small, small, world!

To my loyal LJ reader(s)… you know who you are…
I returned from Disney on my birthday and had about 6 LJ posts formulated in my head.
I posted the first “teaser” just so everyone knew I was home and had fun when, lo and behold, I had a software issue with Mars Edit and LJ and I couldn’t post…
so I got pissed..
and after a week of trying to getting it resolved, it was finally fixed but I had lost my inspiration.
I know, I’m disappointed too…
but I’m going to finally shake it off and try to get back on track.
So here are a couple Disney photos that I have been waiting to feature.

Day 2 at Disney was BEAR DAY…. as in Country Bear Jamboree.
Here is my friend Big Al.

Day 3 was all about EPCOT

Here are JP and Jamie in Canada, O Canada

And JP across the lake from China & Philadelphia (huh)

Next entry will be from the Animal Kingdom…
Stay tuned

So the countdown finally ended on Feb 15, as we headed to the airport. I think I booked this trip back in early September 2008 so the countdown was close to 150 days long.

In those 150 days I booked it, planned it, changed it, re-arranged it, dreamt about it, panicked about it, laughed about it, cried about it, paid for it, and changed it again.

We also decided to go alone, invite my brother and his wife, go alone again, invite our friend Jamie, not invite Jamie, and then finally invite him again.

And after all 150 days it was so nice to hear the hostess greet us at the desk by saying, “Hi Earl, Welcome Home”

And to top it all off, we arrived at 8PM to find out that the Magic Kingdom was on extended hours until 3AM (although we only lasted until around 1AM)

(I’ll add more posts from the entire trip with a few favorite photos but feel free to look at my facebook and flickr for the other 175+ photos.)

PS. For those of you who watch taglines and things like that, I’ll end this post by saying and THAT is why I am “laughing on the inside.” I mean, who wouldn’t be? It IS freakin’ Disney World for Christ’ sake.

Today’s the big day…
It’s been almost 2 years since we’ve been, and finally today we are heading home to the place where dreams come true…